


we'll meet again

by winchesterstupid



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Blurry Woman (Supernatural: Carry On) is Eileen Leahy, Castiel and Dean Winchester Have a Profound Bond, Castiel/Dean Winchester First Kiss, Dean Winchester Loves Castiel, Episode Fix-It: s15e20 Carry On, M/M, Post-Canon Fix-It, Post-Episode: s15e18 Despair, Post-Episode: s15e20 Carry On
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-28
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:41:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27746902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/winchesterstupid/pseuds/winchesterstupid
Summary: Two codas, both starting with MCD death and trying to give that some fuckin meaning in this post-hellshow wasteland.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Kudos: 38
Collections: Destiel is Canon - 15x18 Codas





	1. grief

When they get back to the bunker, Jack wanders to his room, listlessly, drained, looking as numb and lost as they all feel. As numb as Dean wishes he could feel, anyways.

He’s willing to try and get there, though, work his way through the beer shelf in the fridge before moving onto the MoL whiskey library, and then try to find that green bottle that might be absinthe that he previously stashed somewhere in a storage room. Whatever it is, it’ll probably be enough to put this migraine to rest.

Sam has other plans. He drops a hand on Dean’s shoulder—the right one, the one without the—he drops a hand and he stops Dean, roots him to the ground. It’s pretty easy considering they’re both just working on autopilot.

“Dean, wait,” Sam says, voice heavy. “Wait a second, man, before you go drowning yourself in alcohol.”

“What is it?” Dean asks, also keeping his voice low and monotone, just in case. He knows where this is headed and knows it’ll make him hurt more, some damn way, some damn how.

Sam glances at where Jack exited the map room to make sure he’s gone. He keeps trying to make eye contact, even with his red-rimmed crying eyes. Dean refuses. He doesn’t want to see his own emptiness reflect back at him. “Can we talk about Cas? How it went down?”

“Told you. He saved me. The Empty—”

“Yeah, you said he summoned it.”

The unanswerable question hangs in the air. Dean lets it go unanswered.

Sam sighs, a small weak sound. “Please, Dean. He was my friend, too. And he saved you. I want—I have to know how he went out. Please.”

Dean tries not to shut down. Every second is an effort, every second he is aching to be drunk in his bed. “It happened fast. We didn’t stand a chance, man. Billie started fuckin’ with my heart, we had to take cover in the dungeon, and Cas...put up some temporary warding.” Dean stops, breathes shakily, presses the heel of his hand to his temple. “Then the warding started failing. I thought we were both dead until he said there was a way out. It was a verbal summoning, just a—a key phrase or something, I didn’t know what the fuck was happening until it was too late, and there wasn’t much I could do at that point. The Empty didn’t give a shit about me, just took Billie’n him. Left me there without a scratch.”

“Fuck,” Sam murmurs.

“Yeah, fuck. Worked out peachy for me, though, huh?”

“Springing a cosmic deal on you and then sacrificing himself for you? Sounds like Cas.” Sam smiles ruefully.

“Yeah.” His temples throb hotly.

“I just. I dunno. I’m lost. I don’t remember the last thing I said to him—I was all messed up about, um, about Eileen.” Sam keeps wringing his hands. Dean finally looks at him, six foot four of scared kid, and finds that he’s too tired to hurt for Sam, too. That what he wants more than anything in the world is—that absinthe, probably.

“We didn’t get to say goodbye or anything,” Sam says quietly. He digs his thumb into his palm until he notices he’s doing it and stops, forcefully drops his hands. “I keep, um, I keep thinking about how she must have felt.”

“Eileen knew,” Dean says dully. It sounds like a lie coming out of his mouth even if it’s true. “How you felt, I mean. And she knew you were coming to save her. I don’t think she was afraid. Neither of them were afraid when they—went.”

At least Eileen knew, is what he wants to say. At least you didn’t have to watch. And he doesn’t say it because how fucked up is that, wishing he could trade places? Eileen and Cas are both the same amount of dead.

But at least Eileen died knowing.

Sam swallows hard as he nods. “Yeah. Um. Yeah. That’s what I’ve been telling myself. I just—I keep thinking—I don’t want to.” He cuts himself off and shakes his head. “Uh. Did he say anything else? Cas. Before he—went?”

Dean’s muscles seize up of their own accord, a half-second of tautness and bile rising at the back of his throat. He can see Cas’ face like a little photograph printed on the backs of his eyelids. Tearful. Smiling.

“Yeah. Said he cares about you, and Jack. Said we—that he—” Dean’s throat clicks shut. He lets himself shut up for a second, threatened by the sting at the edge of his eyes. “Just the usual.”

“Right. Right.”

“And he was smiling, when he went,” Dean says, and now his voice begins to wobble. “I dunno—I don’t get it, Sam. Death was knocking at the door, and he was killin’ himself, and he was smiling.”

“He knew what he was doing.”

Dean can’t even deny it, because it's true. It's the only true thing he knows. Cas might as well have admitted that this was the only thing he ever knew how to do, die for Dean.

“I’m glad it was his decision. And—I’m glad you were with him. He didn’t have to go alone.” Sam exhales, voice a little more watery. “I’m glad he had a friend there for him at the end.”

In spite of himself and his stupid fucking inability to voice his feelings, Dean mutters, “It wasn’t what he needed.” He swipes a hand over his face, like he’s trying to stop his lips from moving, but the words spill out anyways. “He didn’t want a friend,” he grits out, and his voice does break. “I should have—should have—I should’ve I dunno what. God, Sammy, I mean Jesus fucking Christ, Sam, I should’ve done something, or anything. I didn’t do jackfuckingsquat, I just stood there and I didn’t say anything. I just watched it happen, watched him—an’ I should’ve—I should’ve told him—”

“He knew,” Sam says, touching his elbow. “He knew, of course he did.”

“No he fucking didn’t,” Dean chokes, ripping away, fumbling for the map table for support. He’s gonna start fucking sobbing again even though he thought he already cried his whole stupid fucking heart out in the dungeon. “He told me he didn’t fucking know it and I just let him go anyways.”

“He knew,” Sam says, uncertainly. “That he was our family, that we’d do the same for him.”

Dean wants to smash his hands into the map table until something shatters, and he wants the pounding piercing ringing in his ears to go away, and he doesn’t want to look at Sam, and he wants to tear this bloody jacket off and scream into it like a wild fucking animal.

“That we’re brothers? Good friends? He knew all that shit,” Dean laughs wetly instead. “Oh, he knew all that bullshit, but that’s all he knew, and that’s not good enough—it’s not good enough for him, okay? I fucked up so bad, I can’t take it, I really can’t take it. This is my fucking fault again, so I should be dead. I’d rather be dead. If I had the chance—believe me, Sammy, I’d rather have him back than every other fucking person on this rock, than all of them put together, I would trade it all in a second. I-I should’ve—I wanted to give—I would have given more, and he never knew, I mean he never knew, Sam, and he’s gone and I can’t say it now. I can’t say it even now, especially now, do you get it?”

Sam is breaking apart now too, standing in the middle of the room and just trembling with it all, hands loose and useless at his sides, and this is beyond a chick flick, or God’s petty soap opera, this is a goddamn tragedy, this is a fucking snuff film.

“Yeah, I get it,” Sam tells him helplessly. “Dean. I’m sorry. I get it, I do. I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

“Yeah,” Dean weeps. “Yeah, me too.”


	2. catharsis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pretending 15x20 deserves to be canon...Sam and Dean are in Heaven, I try to tie up the loose ends.

Dean is pissed that he got taken out by a rusty piece of rebar.

In fact, he’s more than pissed, he’s a little embarrassed. It’s stupid. Wasted on a hunting accident after defeating God? Comical, almost, if it hadn’t hurt so goddamn much.

After a few heavenly beers (not the pisswater that Bobby is handing out like he’s some kinda ill-mannered, slightly sadistic receptionist), Dean and Sam start poking fun about his demise, which is maybe kinda fucked up, but also pretty par for both their courses. Besides, it’s Heaven—there’s no responsibilities up here, no need to carry all those bad times around. Just good times, now, just healing. So they can poke a few jokes. It’s a lifetime of tension being released. It feels good to laugh—if Dean is calculating correctly, the last time he laughed was probably sometime during Mrs. Butters’ run.

It’s been a rough few...well, it’s been rough.

At some point Sam mentions that he’s actually like, eighty years old now, even if he still looks like the road-weary little brother Dean left behind in the barn. That’s kinda hard to wrap his head around—Sam is older than him, like, in active dementia years. Dean must seem like a weird memory come to life. For him it’s been maybe an hour since his death, the ache in his back just barely forgotten. For Sam it’s been—Jesus, it’s been fifty years since he’s seen his older brother. He’s spent decades alone.

Not alone, Sam corrects him, clinking their beers together. He’s spent decades with a son and wife and apple-pie life.

And Dean is proud as hell.

“So little Dean II got a college degree and everything, huh?”

“In deaf education,” Sam confirms. “He’s working at a middle school.”

“Eileen must’ve been happy.”

“Yeah,” Sam sighs wistfully. “She is. Dean is everything we could’ve wished for. We worked so hard to make his life comfortable. We wanted to give him everything.”

“You spoiled the shit outta him, huh? Good.”

“Spoiled the shit out of ourselves, too,” Sam says. He shakes his head. “Picket fence and everything. Not a normal life, but a happy one—happier than I ever thought possible, even when I was a kid on my way to Stanford. I still can’t believe it, Dean. I’m so lucky.”

Dean laughs softly, curling his fingers around the sun-warm leather of the wheel. “Man, you really have gone soft.” He grins to let know Sam he’s glad about it. “When’s the last time you, uh, went on a hunt?”

Sam’s fingers ghost up to the bridge of his nose before he smiles sheepishly, drops his hand. He keeps forgetting he doesn’t need glasses here. “Um, it’s been a while. Me and Eileen ended up just doing what Bobby did—working like a hub, research, organizing, putting a web of communication out there. Dean—our Dean, I mean—even helped some. Mostly learning and teaching spellwork. We made sure he never touched a gun.” Sam sighs again. Dean thinks, fondly, _goddamn hippie._

“Well, glad you finally got to settle down. Though I’m not gonna pretend it’s not a little weird you’re like, from the future.”

Sam frowns. “If you want to think about it that way, you’re actually from the past.”

“Uh, no, I don’t want to think about it that way, that’s fucking sad,” Dean retorts. “Okay, just tell me this—how was the new _Bill & Ted_ movie?”

Sam rolls his eyes, scoffs. “Dean—”

“C’mon,” Dean insists. “Give me something. What was the best thing about your life as a retiree? Top ten highlights. Go.”

Sam barely deliberates on it. “My family,” he says with a shrug.

Dean groans. “Cop-out.”

“I miss them,” his older younger brother grumbles. He grumbles a lot now. That reminds Dean of Bobby.

Dean chuckles and knocks against his shoulder, gestures to the car. “Speakin’ of which, man, they’ll be around pretty soon—morbid, I know, I know. But until then we can go anywhere, visit anyone. Bobby’s here—actually, both Bobby’s are here by now. Along with the Harvelles, Ash, Rufus, Pamela, Charlie, Kevin, and Mom and—and Dad.” He doesn’t like the way his voice falters. He turns away instead of thinking about it, and circles around to the driver’s side so he can climb in.

For a moment Sam is equally at a loss for words, but whatever emotion is on his face fades just as quickly as it came. He follows Dean’s lead, taking his time inspecting the car’s interior with an obvious nostalgia. “You know, I never considered two Bobby’s in the same room.”

It’s like they’ve both resolved to leave John’s corner of Heaven alone. Slightly gratified, Dean moves on, revs the engine—it’s like new, like better than it ever was, and the purr of it strengthens his resolve. “Yeah, it’ll be a hoot and a holler. In fact, if you want, I can drop you off at the Roadhouse right now. Meet everybody.”

“‘Drop me off?’” Sam laughs. “You got somewhere urgent to be?”

Dean pulls back onto the road, which is wide and sunny now. He fidgets nervously with the mirror as if he’s expecting traffic. “Uh, yeah, kinda. I know you just got here, Sammy, it’s a long-awaited reunion and I’m very happy—well, relatively happy, you know, sorry you’re dead, by the way—but I gotta—” Dean stares down the road, lips twitching. He can’t help the little smile on his face when he thinks about it, about him. “Well, there’s somebody I wanna see before we get started on eternity.”

Sam’s eyebrows shoot up. “Dean, is—is Jack around?” he asks, like it’s just occurred to him. Dean files that away as Old Man Brain.

“Yeah, kid designed the place.”

“So you've talked to him?”

“No, not yet. But he—well, I guess when he brought back everybody, it really was, uh....everybody.”

“Cas?” Sam asks, though it’s not much of a question.

Dean nods quietly, chewing the inside of his cheek. The usual uncomfortable butterflies in his stomach aren’t there. He just feels content. He’s smiling again; he feels stupid and giddy and content. “Haven’t seen him yet either. Dunno where to find him.”

“I think he’ll have to find you.”

“Yeah. Right. So.” Dean shrugs as casually as he can.

“So, yes, you can drop me off at the Roadhouse.” Sam grins. “It’s been such a long time since I’ve seen everybody. I’m going to eat so unhealthily. You have no idea the dieting you have to do at my age.”

“Can’t get diabetes in heaven,” Dean agrees. “Good thinking, old man.”

Sam doesn’t object.

The road is exactly as long as it needs to be. They bicker a little, they remember old friends they'll get to see soon, they just sit quietly and watch the long black road unwind. Dean grudgingly listens to a post-post-rock band from 2037 that Sam says he’ll like—he doesn’t, but that’s okay. After enough time passes, after Dean can’t wait anymore, the Roadhouse appears, and there’s actual music blaring from the open windows (it sounds like a live band, but if Dean didn’t know any better, he’d say it was Kansas).

Sam hauls himself out of the car, apparently pleasantly surprised when neither of his knees pop. He closes the door and leans back in the window, grinning from ear to ear.

“Good to see you again,” he says. “Jerk.”

Dean rolls his eyes, grudgingly smiles back. “Yeah, sure. You too, bitch.”

“Now go get him.” Sam slaps the hood of the car and pulls back with an excruciatingly cheesy wink.

Through the rearview mirror and the cloud of dust his wheels kick up, Dean watches him saunter into the bar.

After ten minutes (the amount of time it takes to steel himself) the road turns distinctly midwestern, the sky an unrelenting blue. A friendly road sign tells him he’s entering Pontiac.

“Good,” Dean says out loud. “Perfect.”

He wasn’t even certain that’s where he wanted to go, but he can’t think of a better place to do this. This...whatever he’s about to do.

He gets there fairly quickly. The road is a lot shorter when he knows where he wants to go. He pulls over when it feels right, gets out and closes his eyes for a second to feel the sun on his face. It’s doesn’t feel as intense as it was that day, although it probably helps that he’s not dehydrated and caked in dirt. The dark green of the tree-line provides a sharp contrast to the heat coming off the asphalt, and Dean heads in.

He makes his way through the forest, wanting to hurry but taking his time. It was terrifying, that first time, stumbling through the mess of fallen trees without a fucking clue what was going on. Trees snapped like spines, swathes of dead grass and burnt earth. Nothing but crows shrieking at him like late death omens.  
It's peaceful now, more full of birdsong. Eventually he finds the clearing, an area just full of tall grass and the gentle hum of cicadas. He explores it, tries to guesstimate the exact spot it was, ends up figuring any patch of dirt is as good as another. He looks up at the sky, looks around at the treetops swaying in the sunlight; he listens to the songbirds (do birds go to Heaven?) and the gentle hush of the wind.

“Here’s to hopin’ the reception is better up here, huh?" he mutters. He takes a deep breath, and then Dean Winchester gets on his knees and starts to pray.

"Okay. Okay. I know I’m early to the party, man. I didn't plan that, believe me. If you had told me two days ago that I would get got by a vampire clown and a fuckin' screw...well, I guess crazier shit has happened. But, uh, I guess what I'm trying to say is I-I just didn’t wanna be late again, y’know? Heh.” Dean shakes his head, regretting, regretful. “That’s not funny, sorry. Sorry. I’m sorry, man. Oh, Cas, I really—I really am sorry. Can you—can we talk?”

There’s nothing except a breeze that cools the drip of sweat climbing down his neck—go figure, sweating in Heaven. He squeezes his eyes shut, resettles his weight on his thighs, clasps his hands in his lap, and hopes that Bobby got his shit right.

“Calling Castiel, Angel of the Lord our son. I know you’re around here somewhere. You pickin’ up, man? Please?”

The sound of him is hidden in the wind, but Dean feels his presence anyways. He brings that—that fucking energy charge with him, the one that smells like hot metal and breaks bulbs and tears rooves off houses and makes every hair on the back of your neck stand up. And even if he wasn’t a holy hurricane, or a comet or the Chrysler building, Dean would still know him by the weight of his eyes.

He waits, selfishly, for Castiel to speak first.

He waits for a full minute until Cas realizes what the hell he’s waiting for.

“Hello, Dean,” he obliges, like he always obliges; a stupid symphony of gravel, a lived-in sound, the sound of home. His voice is a fucking balm. Dean almost starts crying again, but instead he gets to his feet and turns around. Cas stands at the treeline, hands hanging empty at his sides, and his expression is so fucking earnest and vulnerable that Dean _does_ start to cry again.

“Oh, Jesus, Cas, come here.”

They hug. It’s mostly Dean squeezing the shit out of him, Cas tentatively returning the embrace like they’re holding something fragile between them. Dean just holds him tighter, presses his face against the rough fabric of his coat and takes in the solidity and realness of him.

“You weren’t supposed to be here already,” Cas tells him unevenly, his lips moving almost against Dean’s ear.

“Yeah, well, can’t say I ever do what I’m supposed to,” Dean replies, and no surprise his voice is shaky too.

Cas laughs even as he says, “That’s not funny.”

“I know. But it’s okay.”

“No, it isn’t.”

“No, it isn’t, but I’m okay. Really.”

“Dean.”

Cas breaks away, holds him at arm’s length and tries to catch his eye. Dean stares unabashedly back at him, taking in all the concern. All of the love directed at him. He can’t believe he never saw it before; it seems so obvious now.

“I’m one stupid sonofabitch, ain’t I?” he laughs.

“Dean,” Cas repeats sternly, sadly. Dean grins, knows he’s still got tears in his eyes that negate the grinning. He straightens the tie and smooths out the rumpled lapel, basking in that loving blue gaze.

“It’s okay, though, because you’re pretty stupid too. And a dick, you’re a real fuckin’ dick sometimes, you know?”

“We’re a couple of dumbasses,” Cas says. His mouth quirks in a small smile, like he doesn’t fully understand what’s happening, but maybe—maybe he understands enough, Dean thinks.

“Yeah, that too,” he agrees. “But it’s okay,” he says, “because we’re here, us two dumbasses. We’re together, and that’s what I want, okay?” Dean slides his hands up to Cas’ face, holds him steady so they can see each other through the tears.

Cas says, “Oh."

“Hey, Cas,” Dean says, sweeping a thumb over his damp cheek and down to his trembling lip. 

Cas doesn't blink, barely moves his mouth, unwilling to break away from the touch. "Yes, Dean?"

“I love you too,” he says, watching closely so he can see the smile that spreads across his friend's face.

They kiss, and it’s perfect.


End file.
